U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Primed by widespread use of prescription pain pills, heroin addiction and overdose deaths have increased rapidly over the last decade, touching parts of society that previously were relatively unscathed, federal health officials reported Tuesday. Between 2002-04 and 2011-13, heroin use doubled among women (versus a 50 percent rise among men) and more than doubled among whites (versus a decline in other races and ethnicities combined). It also went up faster in households with incomes between $20,000 and $50,000 than in those with more or less, and among the privately insured. People addicted to prescription opioid painkillers were 40 times as likely to move on to heroin. "We are...

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